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appeared around his mouth. “Duncan has not told you of this?”
    “Duncan doesn’t want to talk about it with me.” And finally I understood why. “I see. He got involved with her. And Marel? Did she think . . . ?” I couldn’t put it into words. “Did the Akkabarran play mother as well as wife?”
    Xonea rose and walked over to the viewport to look out at the stars. He always did that when he didn’t want to answer me.
    This was what it felt like, to have your heart shattered. Interesting. Rather like a massive myocardial infarction, minus the copious sweating and respiratory distress.
    After a long interval my ClanBrother finally spoke. “You should not blame them, Cherijo. Duncan truly believed that you had embraced the stars. So did the little one. They grieved for you in their own way, but . . . the path changes, and so, too, must the traveler.”
    As affirmations went, that was a resounding one. And it killed something inside me, some frail and puny faith that had kept me going since I’d woken up to this new world.
    I had worked hard, compromised, sacrificed, and exhausted myself to care for so many. I’d died a couple of times in the process. I’d overlooked Reever’s inhuman personality, the lack of emotions, the hundred or so stupid things he’d done since we’d met, and finally put my trust in him and the love he had always claimed to feel for me.
    And this was my reward.
    “Give me the codes, Xonea.”
    He came over to the terminal and inputted an override sequence. “I will remain with you.”
    “Not necessary.” I accessed the ship’s logs first.
    “You will have questions.”
    “I’ll find the answers myself.” I turned away and began scanning the first report, and didn’t stop until I heard the door panel open and close. Then I got up, secured the panel, and leaned against the wall. Somehow I ended up in a huddle on the deck, hunched over, the heels of my hands grinding into my dry, burning eyes.
    Jarn hadn’t just helped herself to my body, and erased five years of my life. She’d stolen my family from me.
    And my husband had let her.

    I didn’t waste my time weeping, or tearing out my hair, or otherwise collapsing into a helpless puddle of misery. It would serve no purpose, and if there was one thing I had been created to be, it was useful.
    I spent the next forty-eight hours on the terminal in my quarters, reading first the ship’s logs and then sifting through the database for records of the other events I had missed. I stopped only for food, cleansing, and lavatory visits. I also blocked all the signals that were sent to my quarters from Command, Medical Bay, and several crew terminals.
    Once I’d read through all the data available on the main database, I encountered several new and interesting safeguards protecting the more sensitive data available only to the ship’s commander and senior officers. Although neither my codes nor Xonea’s override would bypass them, I tried one I thought Squilyp might use—the birth date of his twin boys—and gained full access to the restricted areas.
    There I found all the information they were trying to keep from me: records of my whereabouts and activities, surveillance of my personal quarters both on the ship and on Joren, field reports on my movements and sojourns, and enough audio and video to keep me staring at a monitor for several months. Three enormous files contained all the known details from my visits to oKia, Trellus, and Vtaga.
    My, my, my. I had no memory of any of it; the slave girl had been in possession at the time. She’d illegally trespassed on oKia, gotten herself marooned on Trellus, and nearly started a civil war on Vtaga. But to her credit, she’d discovered a new form of crystal, stopped an alien butcher, and cured a plague.
    She’d also brought Reever back to life on Vtaga after SrrokVar—now, there was a name I’d never wanted to hear again—had killed him.
    I had hoped to get in a third day of study